We have entered into a period of interregnum, reflective in chaos, anarchy, and violence. The image of this thug and his ilk give me far more chill than even the freeze we are experiencing.
This individual is not a member of Ghana’s security force. He’s not a member of the armed forces; he’s not a member of the police force; he’s not a member of the BNI; he’s not licensed or authorized to carry a weapon to the location he in.

He’s in camouflage; he’s wearing a balaclava; he’s carrying lethal weapons; he’s carrying instruments to restrain, maim, and murder others. There is no visible identification tag on him; there’s no badge number, or name tag. There is no indication of command structure here.

Once the by-election is over, who would account for the weapons of death that this man wields? Who would secure the weapons? This thug would have seen how he strikes terror in the public. What is to prevent him from going on to make a living as an armed robber or a terrorist. When you put fire in the hands of an arsonist, there is only one predictable outcome.

Yet we claim to be a democracy and the troubling irony here is that this mobster is right in the center of a constituency that is engaged in a by-election. There is a reign of terror while citizens are trying to exercise their basic right. This hired gun represents the death of democracy. He’s the nightmare that would destroy the hopes of Ghanaians to live in a peaceful society.

It would not matter who wins the by-election, but the thuggery becomes the breaching of inviolate lines of decency, society’s core values and beliefs. I expect all civil organizations to strongly condemn this lawless act. I expect parliament to hold special hearings; I expect religious and educational organizations to condemn these acts which would potential doom the nation to savagery.

The lessons are clear, and the histories are painful to recall. Ivorians, Sierra Leoneans, and Liberians lost millions of their citizens and set their nations decades back in development. Who benefits when black people kill one another? The arm dealers and the racists. They would give blacks bigger guns to kill each other! The investors who like to suckle away our resources for pittance would hover like vultures over carrions. There are no winners when citizens decide to murder one another. Ask the ancient Greeks who fought the Peloponnesian war between the principalities of Athens and Sparta in the 5th Century BC.

Rwanda still reels with the cry of thousands whose spirits are forlorn, whose bodies remain unburied, and who would not wish to be disremembered. Why would Ghanaians deliberately seek the path of self- destruction? Why would Ghanaians set fire to dry and bristle grass of politics, and then fan it with roaring Harmattan winds? Have we not seen enough? Have we not learnt enough. Do we feel our fate would be any different from what Rwanda’s, Libera’s, and Ivory Coast’s recent history?

No one can build a nation using the blood of the citizens. No leader has ever succeeded.

Build a nation through the heart, spirits, and love of the people and you would have a foundation that would withstand all challenges. May God Help Ghana.